Talk:The Coral Island

Definition lists

Definition lists are not a sensible way of marking up subheadings. The markup ;Notes produces this html:

<dl>
<dt>Notes</dt>
</dl>

which is a definition list. See http://www.w3.org/TR/html401/struct/lists.html#h-10.3 . Although it may look like bold markup to a sighted reader, anybody using a non-visual agent will hear the start of a definition list, but no definition. We should not be making our text any more confusing for the visually-impaired than we have to, so I have reverted to using the wikimarkup for bold to delineate the headings. That at least is harmless to most screen readers. Ideally, however, the subheadings should be marked up as third-level headers (using ===) but I understand that some people dislike seeing them in the table table of contents. If there is no objection, I'd like to markup those subheaders as <h3>...</h3>, and will do so in the absence of further discussion here. --RexxS (talk) 15:43, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

That's the ticket. What the man said (and you can limit the toc-depth). Br'er Rabbit (talk) 16:13, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

I find your observation of the impact of the leading semicolon on those using screen readers to be persuasive Rexxs, but I'm curious; is it your intention to go through the tens of thousands of other articles that use it for formatting? Br'er Rabbit claims to have "fixed" the Wiki markup documentation, but see this section, which still explicitly describes the use of a leading semicolon to produce non-TOC headings. For the sake of a quiet life I'll add the h3 stuff myself, even though it does involve the additional fiddly step of reducing the depth of the TOC. It's just a shame that some of this effort hasn't been spent in actually, you know, improving the article. George Ponderevo (talk) 16:30, 21 June 2012 (UTC)

I would argue that making an article more accessible to non-sighted readers is an improvement. LadyofShalott 18:10, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

I'm afraid that in my frustration at similar issues unrelated to accessibility that occurred elsewhere at about the same time, such as whether it should be <ref name=ODNB> or <ref name="ODNB">, I allowed my frustration to spill over and distort my meaning. Of course I agree that increasing accessibility is an improvement, but by "improving the article" I mean improving the content of the article, not how it's rendered. George Ponderevo (talk) 19:23, 11 July 2012 (UTC)

GA Review

This review is transcluded from Talk:The Coral Island/GA1. The edit link for this section can be used to add comments to the review.

Reviewer: Sarastro1 (talk · contribs) 22:24, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

No real problems, and a very readable, enjoyable article. Although I confess that I'd never heard of the book or the author! My only minor issue is over in-text attribution of one or two quotes, but (if I understand the MoS correctly) you are perfectly entitled to disagree and say that they do not need attribution.

• "A stickler for accuracy, he subsequently only wrote about things of which he had personal experience.": Is this because he realised he got it wrong about coconuts? If so, maybe worth saying s explicitly.

  I believe it was, or at least it was part of the reason, and I'm sure I've seen someone say that explicitly, but damned if I can find it now. Malleus Fatuorum 23:34, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• "dating books forward was a common practice at the time, especially during the Christmas period": It may be worth adding a reason, if this is known.

  I could speculate that it was a marketing ploy to increase sales at Christmas time, and I'd be pretty sure I was right, but I've got no authoritative answer as to why it was common. Malleus Fatuorum 23:32, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• "Ballantyne had a "deep religious conviction" and felt it his duty to educate Victorian middle-class boys – his target audience – in "codes of honour, decency, and religiosity"": I'm sure it is fine with MoS to leave short quotes like this without in-text attribution, but would it be worth adding who said this?

  I don't have any good working rule of thumb for this kind of question. My general answer is that if the reader wants to know who said something then clicking on the citation gives an instant answer. My main objection to in-text attribution of everything is that it can get rather boring having to keep saying "Critic XYZ says this, whereas critic PQR says that". To know that it was, for instance, Short who claimed that Ballantyne had a deep religious conviction (something that nobody would dispute) doesn't seem to me to add much, if anything, to the reader's understand of the subject. Therefore I tend to attribute in-text only when I'm including quotations from two different writers in a single sentence, or when I think the claim might be considered a rather bold one. Malleus Fatuorum 23:53, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• "The novel exhibits a "light-hearted confidence" in its description of an adventure that was above all "fun"." And it may be worth attributing this.

  As I said above, I don't see any reason why short uncontroversial quotes such as this from a single author should be atrributed in-text. Malleus Fatuorum 00:01, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

• There are one or two other examples of quotes unattributed in the text. Again, not a big deal, and fine with MoS, but it seems a little disconcerting to find some quotes attributed and others not.
• "Modern critics have considered that the text features…": Any particular reason this is not just "Modern critics consider that the text features…"?

  It's a tense-matching thing in my mind. The sentence starts off in the past tense with "The Coral Island was widely admired by its contemporary readers", and to jump to the present tense after that seems a little jarring to me. Malleus Fatuorum 23:32, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• "A simplified adaptation of the book was recommended for grades 7–9.": I'm never too sure of "grades", and there is potential for confusion. Maybe give ages instead?

  I'm never too sure of grades either, but I understand that age range to be 12–14? I'll ask Drmies to comment on that. Malleus Fatuorum 23:32, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• Yeah, grades are always mentioned in such publications from the US. My wife's eighth-graders are between 12 and (even) 15, but roughly, yes 12-14 is correct. Drmies (talk)

  OK, thanks, I've changed that. I find it quite shocking that 12 year olds had to be given a simplified version of the book; I bet your six-year-old would have no bother with it. Malleus Fatuorum 16:32, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

• Is the book still on any reading lists that we know of?

  Not that I know of, but again, I've asked Drmies. Malleus Fatuorum 23:55, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• Interesting question. It's on my nightstand--does that count? Seriously, I doubt it very much: we don't like exciting yarns with an overdose of morality anymore. I'll see what I can dig up. Drmies (talk) 00:14, 16 October 2012 (UTC)
• In short: no. Drmies (talk) 03:26, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

• Tucker 1990 is lacking a publisher; and as a minor point, according to the google book preview, the coconut reference is on pp. 167–68.

  I've added the publisher and amended the page numbering. Malleus Fatuorum 23:35, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

• Other spot-checks fine.
• Images, links, etc are fine.

I will place this on hold for the moment, but these are very minor points. Sarastro1 (talk) 22:42, 15 October 2012 (UTC)

Passing now. Sarastro1 (talk) 16:35, 16 October 2012 (UTC)

Comment: One image licensing issue:

• File:Coral Island 1893.jpg does not have a valid US copyright tag.

Grandiose (me, talk, contribs) 20:38, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

• Fixed this now. Sarastro1 (talk) 20:59, 21 December 2012 (UTC)

Reception

• I'd suggest adding the following:

The Coral Island quickly became one of the most popular 19th-cent (sic) adventure stories and was translated into most European languages during the 50 years following publication.

Source: Carpenter, Humphrey, and Mari Prichard. (1984). The Oxford Companion to Chidren's Literature. New York: Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-211582-0, p. 131

• Victoria (talk) 02:11, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

  Looks good, I'll do that now. Thanks. Eric Corbett 03:17, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Sources

About evil - [1] > mostly first half but picked up again at the end. Negative review (very short) from well-known critic Harold Bloom > page 8. Victoria (talk) 15:44, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Thanks once again. I'll have a read of that later. Eric Corbett 15:48, 2 July 2013 (UTC)

Extraneous detail

The edit was made because at first I thought that this was the only person whose professional status is given. Actually this isn't the case, but the article nevertheless inconsistently applies details for the figures that it offers. For instance, "Brian Street", "M. Daphne Kutzer", "Katharine Anderson" and "Fiona McCulloch" are all not identified by their professional status, but others are. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 12:54, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

That's not true. Brian Street, for instance is identified as the author of The Savage in Literature: Representations of 'Primitive' Society in English Fiction (1975). Eric Corbett 13:01, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

Okay, that leaves the other three cases I pointed out. MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 13:47, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

So what? Similar logic applies. Fiona McCulloch, for instance, is the person who wrote "The Broken Telescope". Eric Corbett 15:18, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

But Susan Maher wrote "Recasting Crusoe", and yet unlike McCulloch was also identified by her occupation (Professor of English). Basically there was a lack of consistency as to when someone's occupation is detailed, which I didn't want to see in this excellent article. Personally I would do without titles/occupations in all cases, but that's another matter; I would have thought there'd be some MoS suggestions for this, but can't appear to find any. Cheers, MasterOfHisOwnDomain (talk) 19:43, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

You'll find that FAC reviewers almost always insist on a brief explanation of who someone is, which is the only reason there's any there at all as far as I'm concerned. Eric Corbett 20:29, 21 March 2014 (UTC)

TFAR

Wikipedia:Today's featured article/requests/The Coral Island --Gerda Arendt (talk) 16:26, 14 June 2015 (UTC)

Lord of the Flies comparison

Which 3 characters in LotF compare with the 3 in Coral Island? Jack and Ralph are obvious as they share names, but is Peterkin analogous to Piggy, or is he analogous to Simon, since together they suggest Simon Peter? This was the view of the teacher when we studied LotF at school. PatGallacher (talk) 00:20, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

Literary and Historical Context

The current text here claims that The Coral Island (published 1857) is rooted in Darwin's theory of evolution (published 1859). This would be a neat temporal trick, and the current text tries to justify this apparent backwards causation as follows: "Published a year before Darwin's Origin of Species (whose ideas were already being circulated and discussed widely), The Coral Island reflects the then prevalent view of evolutionary theory; ..." This is a nice try, but unconvincing as Darwin's decision to finally publish his ideas was (according to the Wiki article, On_the_Origin_of_Species#Time_taken_to_publish due to his receipt of a letter from Wallace on 18 June 1858 which made him realise that Wallace was also on the same track. Ergo, Darwin/Wallace's ideas could not already have been in widespread circulation in the previous year 1857, when The Coral Island was published. If these ideas had already been circulated and discussed widely, then Wallace's letter would not have had its reported impact on Darwin's decision. I'm suggesting the simplest fix would be simply to delete this paragraph? Dodo64 (talk) 00:26, 19 July 2015 (UTC) — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.36.214.37 (talk)

• And I think you should read the sources. Also, please explain why you are signing with someone else's name. Drmies (talk) 00:39, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
  • Hi Drmies, I'm pleased to meet you too. I accidentally posted my comment in the wrong place and then copied it here when I realised, which is why the signature shows as it does. Congratulations if you have never made any errors of this kind. The above comment therefore was indeed posted by me, Dodo64. Turning to the substance of your complaint, if I may call it that - I have read the sources. (The Coral Island, The Origin of Species). I have not read Frank Kermode's essay, but I doubt that any reading of it could persuade me to accept the existence of backwards causation. And you? Dodo64 (talk) 01:06, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
    • Yeah, that's a real nice way to strike up a friendship. The source I meant was indeed Kermode, and maybe reading that will be useful to you. You may think that Darwinism, or indeed theories of evolution, only came into being the year The Origin of Species was published, and if so, you are dead wrong. Note that an 1842 book by Darwin is mentioned in the paragraph as well. Note also the parenthetic comment in our text, "whose ideas were already being circulated and discussed widely", cited to another essay you probably haven't read. That makes two peer-reviewed academic articles, cited in a text perused by a nice batch of seasoned Wikipedia editors as part of the FA review, and I think we're done. Drmies (talk) 01:40, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
      • Oh God. I'd forgotten that The Coral Island was up for TFA today. Eric Corbett 02:03, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
        • Ah, I see now. Hey, Eric, do you have an answer for the section above? I'm not sure I ever read LotF. Drmies (talk) 02:24, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
          • Apart from the fact that it's crap do you mean? Evolution isn't a new idea, as any properly educated person ought to know. Eric Corbett 02:28, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
            • No, the question about the characters, in the section above this one. Drmies (talk) 02:40, 19 July 2015 (UTC)
            • And "Darwinism" isn't "evolution", as any educatied person ought to know. The article says "Darwinism", not "evolution". 220.148.58.167 (talk) 08:32, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

My edits

I changed 'elementary school' to 'primary school'. The article already has mentions of primary school in the lead; it's about a British author and talking about the British education system, so it makes no sense to use the US school system descriptor. I have linked to primary school to elementary school so anyone unfamiliar with the term can click on the link, as I had to do with elementary school. US terms don't take precedence.

Also a sentence about a simplified version for 12-14 year olds didn't state which country. US is not the default in Wikipedia. The country needs stating.

Otherwise, great article and congratulations to those involved. — Preceding unsigned comment added by 217.155.195.19 (talk) 06:17, 19 July 2015 (UTC)

• Describing it as a set book "for primary school children of the early 20th century" is over-specific, as this was a class read in my primary schooling in Glasgow in the 1960s. Of course, I have no reference for that other than personal experience. The curriculum was still rather how-stands-the-Empire and had not changed in many years. Nor had the physical books. AllyD (talk) 07:30, 19 July 2015 (UTC)